Previously, obtaining the best deals on Black Friday required spending hours waiting outside stores like Best Buy or Walmart, rushing inside at the crack of dawn. Nowadays, savvy shoppers are increasingly leveraging ChatGPT and various AI tools to enhance their shopping experience.

For the second year running, Jim Malervy, 46, from Philadelphia, is using ChatGPT along with other AI solutions for his holiday shopping. Last year, thanks to an AI-driven pricing app, he scored a $50 discount on an iPad for his eldest daughter.

This year, he’s on the lookout for a Margot Robbie rollerblading Barbie doll from the blockbuster movie for his younger daughter. He plans to use various apps, including PayPal’s Honey, which helps locate the best prices. His target: a 30% discount.

Avoiding the stress of traditional stores, he notes that AI removes the anxiety associated with missing out on Black Friday bargains. “Sometimes you feel anxious,” said Malervy, who manages the site AI GPT Journal. “You want to make sure you’re getting the best price.”

Malervy is part of the 44% of anticipated Black Friday shoppers expected to use AI this year, according to a survey by research firm Attest conducted among 2,000 consumers. A variety of AI firms, like OpenAI and Perplexity AI, are enhancing their shopping and search features to attract consumers during the holiday season.

Retailers are gearing up for an influx of shoppers over the Thanksgiving weekend. Nevertheless, prominent chains like Kohl’s Corp. and Best Buy Co., which are usually hotspots for Black Friday, released discouraging sales forecasts on Tuesday, warning that consumers are holding out for more significant sales events.

A Glimpse into the Future

American shoppers are approaching the holiday season burdened by various stressors, including inflation, the ramifications of a divisive presidential election, and multiple ongoing conflicts. They are becoming selective about their expenditures, searching for ways to ease the burden of finding reasonably priced gifts.

This situation has prompted some consumers to hand over their holiday shopping to digital bots. Major retailers like Amazon.com Inc. and Walmart Inc. are also harnessing AI to make shopping and deal discovery simpler.

“I truly believe this is a preview of what’s to come,” Walmart’s Chief Financial Officer, John David Rainey, stated in a recent interview, highlighting that the retailer is developing AI tools to improve product search functionalities.

Frédéric Bourgeois-LeBlanc, a 32-year-old from Montreal, explained that his trips to Best Buy for the latest gadgets have become overwhelmingly stressful, requiring extensive research to find the best products at optimal prices. Working in public relations, he now uses Weever.AI, a new platform where shoppers can ask questions and receive product suggestions. This Black Friday, he’s looking for gaming headphones for his Xbox, finding AI to be a helpful tool for someone who isn’t used to in-depth research.

Weever is preparing its systems for a surge in users. “We anticipate a wave,” said Co-Founder and CEO Frédéric Marcoux. Perplexity AI, which has recently launched a shopping bot, also noted an uptick in search activity related to “Black Friday” and “Cyber Monday.”

The use of AI tools modernizes the conventional process of planning a shopping trip. Instead of spending hours organizing store hours and sales, ChatGPT can create an itinerary for even the most passionate Black Friday shoppers.

In a recent inquiry for a Black Friday itinerary, ChatGPT suggested an ambitious 12-hour excursion through New York City, starting at 6:30 a.m. at Macy’s Inc. in Herald Square. The proposed plan included high-end shopping on Fifth Avenue, trendy finds in Soho, stops at Best Buy, the B&H electronics store, and the Strand bookstore, capped off with lunch at Chelsea Market. The itinerary even included a reminder to “stay hydrated and wear comfortable shoes” to tackle the intensity of walking and crowds.

However, generative AI like ChatGPT often requires some fine-tuning. Its responses are not fixed; it operates based on probabilities to determine which answers to present. In some cases, the information it provides might be outdated or incorrect.

When asked, “Where should I go Black Friday shopping in NYC?” ChatGPT recommended lunch at the food hall at the Plaza Hotel, which has been closed for several years.

When prompted for alternatives, it suggested the fast-food chain Shake Shack for lunch and the popular Carbone for dinner, which surprisingly has no reservations available on that day or for the entire following month. ChatGPT warns users about its potential inaccuracies and encourages them to verify any crucial information, as relayed by an OpenAI representative. Subscription versions of the service offer real-time search capabilities and may yield different — and more accurate — results.

Unlocking Deals

In many cases, shoppers find that the best deals are no longer located in brick-and-mortar stores or easily visible on retailer websites. With the rise of dynamic pricing and swiftly changing promotions, shoppers have had to enhance their strategies.

“Sometimes, when you search, it feels like you’re looking at deals from 2020,” noted Lisi, 17, a student and online influencer known as Lisi Shops on YouTube and TikTok, who requested Bloomberg keep her last name confidential. “I want the deals from this year.”

Lisi has been studying AI at school and has begun embracing the use of ChatGPT for finding deals after investing countless hours searching online.

Sana Akibu, a digital merchandising manager from Gaithersburg, Maryland, explained that she now starts every shopping inquiry with ChatGPT.

Last year, she found a bracelet deal on Instagram but later was unable to relocate it. “I knew I’d seen their deals before. So I thought, let me ask ChatGPT and see what happens,” Akibu said.

She asked the bot for promo codes from the brand, specifying the date to confirm it was a current deal. “This opened up a whole new shopping experience,” she stated. She intends to utilize the bot for her family’s Black Friday shopping and likely more in the future.

© 2024 Bloomberg

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